County responses to Goal 5 of LCDC planning goals and guidelines PublicDeposited

Descriptions

Recent national and state legislation reflect a
growing awareness of the need for comprehensive cultural
resource management programs. Various pieces of federal
legislation and Oregon's Senate Bill 100 demonstrate a
willingness of governments to provide for such programs.
The administration of local land use issues at the state
government level has created much controversy in Oregon
within the last decade. Controversy was brought to a
climax with the enactment of Senate Bill 100.
Senate Bill 100 created the Land Conservation and
Development Commission (LCDC) in 1973 and gave the Commission authority to establish planning goals and guidelines to be used by local governments in the comprehensive
planning process. Goal 5 requires the local planning
departments to inventory various resources of the state,
including historic areas, sites, structures and objects,
and cultural areas.
LCDC has encountered difficulties in attempting to
implement Planning Goal 5 at the local government level.
Problems facing the local planning departments represented
here by six Oregon counties in meeting the cultural resource
element of Goal 5 are also examined. Using both a descriptive
treatment and systems analysis as the approach to data analysis, it is found that the many problems confronting county
staffs are important factors relating to the overall quality
of responses to Goal 5. County staffs' ill-preparedness to
conceive of the goal, let alone respond, is a result of their
lack of orientation to and training for the directed task.
The vagueness of goal requirements, leading to a maze of misinterpretations, lack of understanding, and the lack of the
ability to conceptualize the problems at hand, have created
a conflict situation. It is concluded that the degree to
which counties have managed to resolve conflicts and overcome problems contributes directly to the quality of responses,
LCDC has not determined specific criteria for evaluating county responses to Goals for the plan acknowledgment
process. Lack of specific criteria for evaluation has placed LCDC in the position of evaluating county responses
without adequate data bases, which in turn has led LCDC to
acknowledge compliance for some comprehensive plans which do
not fully comply to Goal requirements.